Editorial Reviews

Product Description

The Epic Zombie Shocker Returns As You've Never Seen It Before!

Two traveling companions, George (Ray Lovelock of AUTOPSY) and Edna (Christine Galbo of THE KILLER MUST KILL AGAIN), come across a small town infested with the "living dead" that are satisfying their cannibalistic hunger on anyone they come across. Discovering that an agricultural machine using radiation waves is at the root of all the havoc, George and Edna fight for survival and their innocence as they are pursued by a relentless detective (Arthur Kennedy of THE ANTICHRIST and FANTASTIC VOYAGE) who is convinced they are responsible for the ghoulish acts of violence plaguing the countryside. All this leads to a gruesome showdown at the Manchester Morgue - an ending that knots a horrifying twist in the lives of all involved!

Also know as LET SLEEPING CORPSES LIE and DON'T OPEN THE WINDOW, this carefully constructed and beautifully photographed tale of the undead roaming the English countryside comes from acclaimed Spanish Director Jorge Grau. Now fully restored and remastered in High Definition from the original camera negative, Blue Underground is proud to present THE LIVING DEAD AT MANCHESTER MORGUE in this 2-Disc Special Edition bursting at the seams with exclusive new Extras!

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

Anchor Bay delivers the best and most anticipated horror DVD of the year. Never released on home video in the US (except in an atrocious edited low-budget EP VHS version called "The Living Dead"), Grau's super-fun 1974 zombie flick finally receives the definitive presentation it has aways deserved! Originally released theatrically in the States in an edited version called "Don't Open the Window", this DVD is the original UNCUT version and instantly makes the old (and once Very Valuable) Japanese laserdisc completely obsolete since that version pixelated the brief nudity. Anchor Bay's DVD is absolutely exceptional.If you're a zombie film fan or european horror buff, you probably already love this film. If you've never seen it, just go ahead and buy it --- you will NOT be disappointed! It's kind of a rip-off of NOTLD, but it has it's own unique twists, it's in glorious color and delivers some very shocking gore moments. Plus, the zombies are quite unique -- my favorite is the post-autopsy one who's got his chest stitched closed all the way down his torso. All in all, a very entertaining zombie film...not as ridiculous as the later Fulci films, but also not as grim as Romero's seminal classic. The film is presented here in a practically flawless print at 1.85:1.Also on the DVD are a short (and amusing) introduction by Grau (who hopes we have a "bad time" watching the film) plus a separate 20-minute interview with him. He goes into detail about how the film came to be, how he picked the cast, and what he thinks of horror film audiences. He comes off as a very cool, intelligent and nice guy. Too bad he left the business after only a few films.Read more ›

I'm pretty much in agreement with most of the reviews posted here, so I'd just like to add a comment or two of my own.First, to those who've wanted to own this movie for years, this Anchor Bay release is definitely the one to buy. Not only is this the original, uncut version of "Let Sleeping Corpses Lie" but it has also been digitally remastered so the picture and sound are GREAT (on both VHS and DVD). You won't be getting a faded, cheap looking film to video transfer -- trust me on this. In case you're wondering, the VHS version is in 1.85 to 1 widescreen ratio and includes all the same extras (director interview, original trailer, etc.) as the DVD version. The only difference, of course, is that with DVD you can access these extras instantly. With the VHS version, you have to fast forward to the end of the movie before you can sample the extras.That being said, let me make caution all those zombie movie fans out there who've never heard of this film before but are intrigued by the other reviews. No doubt scores of you are salivating right now at the prospect of a zombie movie that's almost good as "Dawn of the Dead" (as some have suggested).Please note the following: this is NOT a wall-to-wall zombie/action flick like "Dawn of the Dead" or or even the parody "Return of the Living Dead". In fact, (SPOILER ALERT) I counted maybe only seven or eight zombies in the *whole* movie, and there are never more than three zombies on screen at one time! You *won't* find scenes depicting hundreds (or even dozens) of zombies taking over a city, surrounding a shopping mall, or even invading a farm house. This is a more subtle horror film that's far more interested in evoking a spooky atmosphere and creating a sense of dread than piling on the body count.Read more ›

If you've watched your Romero and Fulci Zombie films to death and you're wanting something just as good, but different, check this little nasty out. A Spanish film inspired by Night of the Living Dead that came out before Dawn of the Dead started the carnivorous Zombie craze. This is one of the few genuinely creepy Zombie films. Night of the Living Dead and Zombie were the only other two that I found creepy. Dawn and Day of the dead were superior films, but I would never say they were creepy. The story is ambiguous in a true European way, and the cinematography is gorgeous and nightmarish at the same time. Also the Zombies are truly chilling. The gore sequences are well done and the acting is top notch.

I gotta tell ya, the negative reviews for this movie kinda piss me off. If you've seen this movie at all you've almost gotta be a zombie/euro/indie/whatever horror buff. And if you don't like this at all, but you love, say, 'Zombie' than it looks to me like you've got no interest in genuine horror or atmosphere or anything other than gore and maybe camp. Now, I like gore a lot, and unintentionally campy films, but there's a helluva lot more to the genre than that. And, I don't like it when people take all this stuff as camp, cause I think some of these films are pretty damn good. Though, they make a significant point clear, which is that your pure gore/camp viewer probably isn't going to like this much, even though he likes zombie movies in general. It's got a fair bit of zombie carnage at the end, but it's got an overly long build up, and even once the zombies show up in mass the film is mainly interested in scaring you, rather than grossing you out. And though it isn't actively scary, I think it's sufficiently creepy and creates a certain desolate mood that I really like. Frankly, as far as using zombies for actually horror, rather than gore, purposes, I think 'Let Sleeping Corpses Lie' is the best one I've seen other than NotLD. In fact, it's pretty severely derivative of that film, even beyond more of less lifting the antagonists from it, but I don't much mind. Hell, I'd like to see more zombie movies be influenced by that film. (Which is still the greatest horror movie ever, I think. `Dawn of the Dead' might be better in general, but it isn't nearly as effective as a horror movie, even if it makes up for it in other ways. But, anyway...)

I won't go into the plot too much. Edna and George are unexpectedly thrust together on the British country side...Read more ›